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Windows 2000 "Hotstream" Project

Gurgelmeyer

By Gurgelmeyer
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At0mic

At0mic

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Ok :) Just two extra questions then:

1) You're talking about hundreds of patches, but WU shows about maybe 20 of them after the rollup... where do these "hundreds" come from?

That's what is special about the USP 5 - it contains >300 bugfixes which cannot be dl'ed directly.  Some are cumulative, so roughly 5-700 bugs are fixed (probably closer to 700 than to 500).  It also contains the publicly available fixes of course.  :)

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Gurgelmeyer

Gurgelmeyer

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CatRoot stores all the digitally signed .cat files which contain the MD5/SHA1 checksums of most unsigned files. Here's an example:

c:\winnt\system32\ie4uinit.exe does not contain a digital signature - actually very few files in Windows do. The checksum (MD5 or SHA1) of this file is listed inside NT5.CAT. Generally, .cat files are - roughly speaking - nothing more than lists of checksums! The NT5.CAT file is however digitally signed by Microsoft. So: when Windows needs to verify if ie4uinit.exe is authentic, it computes the checksum of ie4uinit.exe, and searches all .cat files for this checksum. If the checksum appears in ANY installed .cat file, AND that .cat file has a valid digital signature from Microsoft, Windows will consider ie4uinit.exe to be authentic ("signed"). That's basically how it works :)

NT5INF.CAT and NT5.CAT are mirrored in the dllcache btw. Another important thing is, that just copying .cat files to the CatRoot will not install them.

If you want to really lose the CatRoot you'll have to be very sure that all signature checking in Windows is effectively disabled. Also you should be aware of "exception packages". An exception package is a set of files which includes a .cat file and an .inf file which does the installation. They are called exception packages because they use the device driver installer to install files which are not device drivers at all. Installation will fail if the .cat file cannot be installed. Most hotfixes for 9x and NT4 are exception packages, usually wrapped up as a Type2 hotfix. Generally, most Type2 hotfixes contain exception packages, so those won't install without a CatRoot unless you unpack them and remove all references to .cat's from the .inf files.

Gurgelmeyer B)

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Gurgelmeyer

Gurgelmeyer

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Hi - don't worry :lol: - I'm just behind schedule as usual :}

USP 5.0 SR-1 now has all August and September hotfixes plus a few rebuilt ones, and a few very old ones that I'd missed completely - a total of >40 new fixes! I finally got so fed up with .msi files that I decided to read everything I could find about them - now I'm extending my service pack builder so it updates MSI embedded media streams and all file version tables. Hope to finish it today - I've been doing nothing else for a week or two now, but now I actually understand MSI's.

Also I fixed some registry bugs in HIVECLS.INF, which caused the Active Directory typelib not to register properly or not to register at all during setup. MS even repeated this bug in SP4 and URP1. But it's fixed now.

My messenger is FULL :wacko: - I should sign in more often, but the MSI thing took all my time lately - plus I've been sick for some time too. Nothing serious - just annoying.

Best regards

Gurgelmeyer B)

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Gurgelmeyer

Gurgelmeyer

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Thanks, guys :)

I'm still not well so I guess it's back to bed soon, however I did finish the USP 5.0 SR1 last night. I then tested some SP4 and USP5 integrated installs on NTFS (which I dont use very often). The SP4 default file permissions are all wrong or inadequate - I'm chocked! Had to use cacls to even make ARP work for the built in system components!! Should I attempt do something about it?

Best regards

G B)

Edit: might not be as bad as I thought - sorry, MS - I should get some rest and clear my mind :wacko:

Edited by Gurgelmeyer
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dirtwarrior

dirtwarrior

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Got a question about 2k the following files seem to be the same

ntoskrnl

ntkrpamp

ntkrnlmp

ntkrnlpa

They each have a different function but are all needed? Does windpws 2000 have acpi support?

Gurgelmeyer I had the flu like systoms about 2 weeks ago. It wasnt pretty, so I kind of know what you are going through. Nothing seems to rid of it all you can do is try to stay hydrated while it works its way out on its own.

Edited by dirtwarrior
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Gurgelmeyer

Gurgelmeyer

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Hi - still got a fever - but staying in bed is too boring :}

@dirtwarrior - the NTKRPAMP and NTKRNLMP are for the multiprocessor HAL's and P4 HT. Unlike XP/2k3, W2k sees a HT CPU as two CPU's if HT is enabled. The NTKRNLPA and NTOSKRNL are for singleprocessor HAL's. (These files are not the HAL's - but they implement some OS functionality which depends on the HAL). The NTKRPAMP and NTKRNLPA are for ACPI HAL's, and the NTKRNLMP and NTOSKRNL are for non-ACPI HAL's. To complicate things a bit further, the installed SYSTEM32\NTKRNLPA.EXE is a copy of either NTKRPAMP (multiprocessor acpi) or NTKRNLPA (uniprocessor acpi), and the installed SYSTEM32\NTOSKRNL.EXE is a copy of either NTKRNLMP (multiprocessor non-acpi) or NTOSKRNL (uniprocessor non-acpi). Hope that clears it up.

Anyway, found out what caused the NTFS permission problem: me :blushing: . I had made a minor typo in the winnt.sif that I use for testing, which caused setup to trash it's own memory and - as a side effect - not properly set the permissions. Fragile stuff - be very sure that you got everything 1000% correct if you ever configure your network settings from winnt.sif!!

Best regards,

Gurgelmeyer B)

PS - I'm planning to release USP 5.1 BETA 1 (not quite done) and USP 5.0 SR-1 (completely done) when I get better. I'm hoping to the last minute that a fix for the CPU HALT problem emerges, which is why I haven't released USP 5.0 SR-1 yet (but I really have finished it :lol:).

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fdv

fdv

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Hey Gurgelmeyer, long time no see. A bunch of us are comin' over with chicken soup, beer, and hookers. :thumbup

I'm wondering, since you dig up info on nonpublic fixes, does Microsoft even _know_ about the HALT bug? As in, do they even pay attention to what's going on outside their walls, that you have seen? Wondering if there is any hope on this.

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dirtwarrior

dirtwarrior

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Thanks for clearing all this up for me :blushing:

I installed USP 5.0 slipstreamed into 2k

hardly any problems :thumbup

I typed in msconfig(missing) hmmmm

Can I intergrate this into the install cd?

To my surprise the source was about 6 mb smaller with your SP

This is cool

Hope you feel better soon

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Daemonforce

Daemonforce

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Windows 2000 doesn't have an msconfig. Here's an idea, go get your XP CD and rip the msconfig from that or better yet an XP beta. If you don't want msconfig from XP, just run startup.exe instead. It's somewhere on that XP disc. o_O

Edited by Daemonforce
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